Do You Think Türkiye/Turkey Is A European Country Or Asian (or Both Of them) and why?

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"Do You Think Türkiye/Turkey Is A European Country Or Asian (or Both Of them) and why?"

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[u/Doom_3302]

Geographically it's both. But culturally I have always seen Turkey as central asian.

[u/SHIELD_Agent_47 → u/Doom_3302]

That is my thinking as well, given the ties which the Republic of Türkiye maintains with Turkic peoples as far away as the Uyghurs based in China, though it is made all the more ironic that average Turkish citizens are mostly Greek by genetics, to the point of being visually indistinguishable from average Greek citizens.

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[u/Momshie_mo → u/SHIELD_Agent_47]

Turkey was originally Greek before Islam. Istanbul's old name was Constantinople.

Essentially, Turkey is European.

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[u/Real_Sir_3655]

I think it’s a middle eastern country.

[u/alexklaus80 → u/Real_Sir_3655]

That’s the same way I see it, although I know almost nothing about Turkey and had no real interaction with anyone from there, so the way I see it is also quite vague and subject to change quickly.

Edit: I also hear Turkish people posting online about their ethnic ties with north Eastern Asia (which seems to be popular take there to fine extent) but none of that convinced me that there’s such ties. I mean I won’t go out of my limbs just to disprove the ties either, but I’m just saying that I don’t find the immediate familiarity thus I just recognize their unique quality by its geographic position.

[u/Momshie_mo → u/alexklaus80]

Does Turkey know its history? Before Islam, it was very Greek. 

Constantinople, now called Istanbul, was the capital of the Eastern Roman empire. The Byzantines saw themselves as Romans.

It only started to become "Turkish" by the 1400s when Constantinople fell.

[u/alexklaus80 → u/Momshie_mo]

It's beyond the imagination for someone like me who come from the country where the history started about a couple of millenia behind Turky. And local history for me was overwhelming for me already - I wonder how much in depth it would be covered over there in those countries with super rich history, not only Turky but also like China, India etc.

[u/our_cut_remastered → u/Real_Sir_3655]

Tbh they have almost nothing in common with ME, neither ethnicity nor culture

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[u/Horace919]

European. Constantinople (Istanbul), Anatolia, Hmm, mentioning these place names reminds me of the Eastern Roman Empire, which is part of Western history. And as far as I know, Turkey's various sports events and e-sports competitions are all in the European region.

[u/UnbiasedPashtun]

Northern West Asian overall, most similar to Kurds and Caucasus people, especially Azerbaijanis. But Balkan Turks would count as European.

[u/our_cut_remastered]

I think it's high time we call a bunch of countries in that region Eurasian

[u/SHIELD_Agent_47 → u/our_cut_remastered]

Yeah, that is indeed a significant geological distinction which everyone in the world ignores for European-based cultural politics. In fact, I just googled the height of the highest peak in the Ural Mountains, and it is a pitiful 1894 metres above sea level. The highest mountain in Taiwan is 3886 metres above sea level, which demolishes anything in the heart of the Russian Federation!

[u/ModernirsmEnjoyer]

European is defined in the same way OpenAI defines AGI, which is complete nonsense.

I think Eastern Europeans talk about actively becoming European and behaving like European. So it's more of an aspiration or pretense

[u/[deleted]]

We are all Eurasian

[u/EreshkigalKish2]

i think Turkey is both it has a very European-Mediterranean side & progressive with a deep love of knowledge which i deeply admire & sometimes envy their institutions. 🇹🇷 schools , 🇹🇷national libraries is open 24 seven for researchers absolute amazing imo. they are probably among the best in the region, 2nd perhaps to Israel. But Turkey is also very much West Asian you can tell from its various language & cultural values they are rooted in the region Neo Aramaic & Syriac speakers Assyrians & Syriacs natives are not European at all they're west asian linguistically or ethnically same with Turks . Also 🇹🇷 they are not European in the cold sense 🇹🇷 people are warm with great hospitality, very expressive & carry traditions that set them apart imo . they are not cold people like Europeans

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[u/1oonatic]

Turkiye is a transcontinental country geographically and, in effect, culturally. A majority of it sits in western Asia, while a part of it lies in Europe. The country sort of ties the two continents together. Culturally, it has a lot of ties to both Central Asia, which is where the ancestors of Turkish people came from, and to Europe, evident in literature and art, architecture, food, and fashion. So, I wouldn't say it's distinctly one over the other.